(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a surface treatment composition, a decorative floor covering, and a method for manufacturing the same, and more particularly, to a polyurethane based surface treatment composition having excellent stain resistance a decorative floor covering of which the surface is treated by this composition, and a method for manufacturing the same.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Generally, a residential decorative floor covering, which is mainly used for finishing floors of a living room and a bed room for an individual residence or apartment, not only provides a hygienic space that covers the dust and no coldness of a cement floor, but also has a decorative effect by transforming the space into a cozy indoor living environment in accordance with aesthetic patterns of various colors printed on its surface.
When such surfaces of these conventional decorative floor coverings are stained with polluting materials, customers sometimes can not remove all traces of the polluting materials easily. Materials staining decorative floor coverings are mainly divided into writing materials, foodstuffs and beverages, and household goods. These writing materials include oil based magic marker pens, ballpoint pens, other writing inks, Chinese inks used for brush writing, color pencils, pastel crayons, fluorescent hi-liting pens, etc. Staining foodstuffs and beverages include soysauce, soybean paste, hot pepper paste, noodles with bean sauce, curry, starch syrup, grape juice, watermelon, yogurt, ketchup, chocolate, persimmons, coffee, mustard, cocoa cola, kimchi juice, etc. Other household goods that can stain include shoe polish, disinfectant, dermatophytosis healing agents, nail polish, oil paint, water paint, varnish, pigment solutions, natural dye transfer agents, paper dye transfer agents, children's urine, etc.
Surface treatment methods for decorative floor coverings include a method of hardening polyurethane based paints using ultra violet (UV) rays, a method of water-treating polyurethane based paints to dry the paints, and a method of laminating the decorative floor covering using stain resistant films such as a fluorine film. Of these surface treatment methods the first method of curing polyurethane based paints using UV rays has a fast curing rate, excellent coating performance as well as curing characteristics, a small amount of energy consumption, is pollution free, and is particularly preferable for the improvement of stain resistance characteristics.
Conventionally, a composition using soft type urethaneacrylate oligomer and containing a large amount of single functional group monomer 2-hydroxypropylacrylate as a polyurethane based surface treatment composition has mainly been used to provide abrasion resistance and scratch resistance for decorative floor coverings. Although soft type urethaneacrylate oligomer can soften a decorative floor covering and provides abrasion resistance and scratch resistance, it has poor stain resistance due to the oligomer's low density of elaborate cross-links. Further, the single functional group monomer 2-hydroxypropylacrylate, a substantial amount of which is used to lower the viscosity of urethaneacrylate oligomer, has a slower reaction speed than that of a multi-functional group monomer since a single functional group monomer (as opposed to a mufti-functional group monomer) is greatly affected by oxygen disturbing the curing of the surface. Therefore, because of such problems, surfaces with surface treatment layers using large amounts of single functional group monomers can not be precisely manufactured to furnish stain resistance properties on decorative floors.